...Again, the logic of it all is straightforward. Democratic liberal societies (terror seems always to be directed at liberal states, which threaten autocracies and tribes) have created so much material comfort and liberty that they purportedly abhor sacrifice and any potential interruptions of the good life, whether material, spiritual, or psychic. Thus they are willing to appease, tolerate, or ignore terror, preferring instead — after the obligatory cruise missile and saber-rattling speech — to pay some type of blackmail, grant some type of political concession, or simply vacate the premises. And our enemies are right — if the embassies in Africa, the Iran hostage-taking, the Beirut bombing, the USS Cole attack, and a host of other assaults on assorted individual Americans, embassies, planes, and ships are any indications.

Their devilish methods are entirely parasitic. Hamas or the Baathists can no more craft on their own an RPG, a tactical missile, or a nuclear weapon than they can build a cell phone or a Honda. Uday's stash of pills and cars was the logical counterpart to Saddam's imported arsenal — Western material goods without the inconvenient cargo that was responsible for their creation, whether democracy, rationalism, secularism, or individual freedom.

What then are the ultimate aims of terrorists and state killers? What exactly does a crackpot Iranian mullah, a crazed Taliban, the sons of Saddam, or one of bin Laden's executioners really want with us? A sort of alternative existence to the West, upon which they both feed and prey, like some sort of toadstool that, with sufficient rain and neglect, sprouts up amid an otherwise lush green lawn...